


Synchronization

by Cameron_McKell



Series: Upon Further Review [34]
Category: Tron (Movies), Tron - All Media Types, Tron: Evolution, Tron: Legacy (2010)
Genre: F/M, Muteness, Non-Human Humanoid Society, Non-Human Humanoids, Soul Bond, Tron Fanworks Month, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-01
Updated: 2014-04-01
Packaged: 2018-01-17 20:38:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1401685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cameron_McKell/pseuds/Cameron_McKell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anon struggles to communicate. Tron helps him find a solution. Quorra is the one left speechless.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Synchronization

**Author's Note:**

> For Tron Fanworks Month on Tumblr Week 2 - Fluff.

Tron and Alan-One were engaged in low-priority audio exchange when Quorra and Anon landed.

 

As had become routine, he turned until she was centered in his visual input, her helmet still in place. In the majority of circumstances, he wasn't bothered by the fact that Flynn had written him hastily; he was still functional, after all, but shortcuts had been taken and some information was missing, like outputs for audio and video. In other circumstances – like his current one – it left him unable to 'give voice' to the level of affection he had for the program in front of him.

 

Unaware of his current process progression, Quorra turned to join the other two, tucking her baton away, but Anon reached out a hand to stop her. She stopped accordingly, and turned to look at him. He hesitated in pinging her with text though, struggling to turn feeling into words, until she tilted her head, and prompted him quietly. “Anon?”

 

Her audio output – slightly distorted through the filter of her helmet, but recognizably hers – was the most beautiful thing he'd ever heard.

 

Still unable to form a reply, he tipped forward to rest his helmet gently against hers, then let go.

 

She lingered a microcycle longer in the contact, then gently stroked from the side of his helmet down to his shoulder and pulled away to join the others.

 

Anon followed after her at half speed, until he was side by side with Tron, guarding the portal as ISO and User departed. Quorra had dismissed her helmet, and he could just see her eyes peeking at him from around Alan-One's shoulder.

 

He waved feebly at her as the Portal's light surged, then he and Tron were alone in the dimming exit port.

 

“Tell me.”

 

Anon looked over at Tron, who was half-turned to look at him expectantly.

 

No elaboration was forthcoming, so he tilted his head slightly to convey confusion.

 

“Something is troubling you,” Tron replied, then shook his head when Anon pinged him with an optimal status report. “Not system-critical, but important to you. Tell me, and we can both look for a solution.”

 

Anon hadn't been active during Rinzler's runtime, so at times he was slow to connect the system records of Clu's enforcer, with Unit 1 of System Security. As part of his rectification, Rinzler had been stripped down, and lost 'superfluous' outputs like audio and video.

 

Perhaps Tron knew a solution.

 

He nodded in acceptance, then began drafting an explanation while following Tron to the light fighter he'd brought Alan-One to the portal with. It was another point of User strangeness to Anon that while comfortable with the concept of flying, Alan-One was extremely reluctant to pilot a lightjet himself; no explanation for this had yet been given, but Tron cast significant looks at Sam any time it was mentioned in their combined presence.

 

With Tron piloting, the flight was brief, such that Anon pinged Tron with the last segment of his predicament as they came in for a landing.

 

“I don't have any current solution,” Tron apologized after processing the last installment, then looked thoughtfully toward the Grid's Internet gateway.

 

“I can search for one, though.”

 

Anon nodded, and that was the last update he received on the topic for 2.714 cycles.

 

* * *

 

 

It had been almost three weeks since Quorra had been able to visit the Grid. 'Changing the world' was surprisingly time-consuming, so it was a relief when she could slip away, back to her home on the Grid, at least for a little while.

 

So many of her sensors were useless Out There; it left her feeling damaged if there was nothing to distract herself with. Usually distraction came fairly regularly in the form of Tron, visiting the User world and giving her hapless sensors something to _sense_. 

 

Tron hadn't visited in weeks, though, and Roy hadn't seen him at all while he'd been on-Grid improving and performing maintenance on the energy transfer infrastructure. All the programs he'd asked – and had been willing to reply to him – hadn't known where Tron had gone, so Sam had asked her to ask around as payment for him helping her disappear for the weekend.

 

Tron and Anon were waiting for her outside the Arcade.

 

“That was easy,” she declared with a smile, which grew into a full giggle at the perplexed headtilts it earned her.

 

“What?” Tron voiced the question both programs were thinking.

 

“You'd been missing,” she replied, walking toward the two. “It made the Users nervous.”

 

Tron nodded in slightly embarrassed understanding. “I was searching for something.” He gestured with one hand, drawing attention to the prepared data packet he held, shaped like a Bit at rest. Dropping it into her hands as he brushed past, Tron waved over his shoulder. “I should go apologize.”

 

Quorra was peripherally aware of the data packet shifting to 'Yes' Bit shape and auto-downloading while Tron rezzed in a lightcycle and drove off.

 

“I don't understand.”

 

Anon walked up to stand beside her as the download finished, and Quorra almost crashed because it was –.

 

Anon brushed against her arm lightly, and in that moment she could  _feel_ him. She understood the dedication he, as a Basic, had to his function, and his fulfillment in performing it, his irritation with some 'unnecessary' design elements – like stairs – that vaguely linked back to the shortcuts ingrained into his code, and throughout everything, a fierce emotion that was so much more than simply 'love' that words couldn't accurately describe it.

 

Her audio output froze up, until that  _feeling_ was under some form of control, and instead the foremost feeling –  _Anon's_ foremost feeling – was curiosity about her, and a blank 'request' ping.

 

Quorra broke the light contact connection so she could hold his hand in hers, then shared the core of her self with him, as he'd done for her.


End file.
